Refugees and Human Rights

Debate between Emily Thornberry and Lady Hermon

Wednesday 24th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Emily Thornberry]

My hon. Friend is a mind reader: that is exactly what I was about to suggest.

The concern is that this money could trigger a domino effect. Given that most of UNRWA’s costs are local staff salaries, cuts would mean severance payments and severance payments would mean further cuts, and the vicious cycle goes on. UNRWA could face a Catch-22 situation in which it cannot afford to maintain its services, but risks bankruptcy if it cuts them, which would be a devastating scenario for Palestinian families. It is a humanitarian crisis in the making—we know that—entirely caused by the egomania of the American President.

Although we would all welcome today a commitment of extra money from the UK—I hope that that is what we will hear—we know that short-term fixes by individual countries will not ultimately solve the problem. What we need, as my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden) has said, is a long-term and multilateral solution to this shortfall. May I urge the Government today to lead that international effort and consider initiating a special funding conference, such as that held for humanitarian emergencies—the difference in this case being that we must not wait for that emergency to strike before acting? If it is not to be us, who will do it?

The fourth challenge concerns those countries trying to recover from major conflict whose stability and peace must be nurtured, lest they again collapse. We think of Afghanistan, Iraq and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. More recently, we think of Libya, about which the shadow International Development Secretary will again speak later.

I want to focus today on Lebanon, which, for decades, has lurched from devastating conflict to chronic instability. Its peace must be preserved as it becomes the latest battleground for regional control between Iran and Saudi Arabia. In November, Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri was invited to take a camping trip in Saudi Arabia with Crown Prince Salman. When he arrived, he was roughed up by Saudi guards and forced to read a televised statement announcing his resignation. He had to beg for a suit so that he did not resign in a T-shirt and jeans. If Riyadh’s plan was to provoke instability and civil conflict inside Lebanon, that certainly backfired, because instead it triggered a wave of support for Hariri that allowed him to return and withdraw his resignation.

But if that was a bullet dodged, we must still ask, “Why was it fired?”, because Lebanon cannot afford another war that would risk dragging in Israel, along with Iran, and create a fresh humanitarian crisis in a country that is already cracking under the weight of 1.5 million refugees from the war in Syria and hundreds of thousands more from Palestine. Does the Minister know what on earth Crown Prince Salman was playing at in November? Will he urge the Saudis not to do anything more, whether political interference or financial penalties, that weakens or destabilises Lebanon further? Will he also urge Israel to recognise that any short-term urge it has to damage Hezbollah must be outweighed by the long-term damage that another regional war would do?

The fifth and final challenge concerns countries affected by climate change. Of course that means all of us, but the sad truth is that some of the poorest countries that have contributed the least to global carbon emissions will be those hardest hit by the changes that we have created. Their physical infrastructure is the least well prepared to cope with flooding, droughts and other extreme weather events, because their economies are the least well adapted to cope with long-term changes such as erosion or pollution of farmland. One example is the Mekong delta in Vietnam, which is the traditional home of the country’s agriculture and is now plagued by rising sea levels and incursion of saltwater. Livelihoods that have lasted centuries are being wiped out. Over the past 10 years, a net 1 million people have left the delta—twice the national average of migration from rural areas.

That is climate change in action, and a pattern that is being repeated across the world. If we cannot reverse these trends, regions that are currently just in trouble will in due course become uninhabitable. The carbon targets we meet in this country will matter nothing in the grand scheme of things unless we show global leadership in helping the rest of the world, including the United States of America, to face up to the challenge of climate change. Will the Minister tell us, first, where in the Government’s list of overseas funding priorities is helping poorer countries adapt to climate change? Secondly, when Rex Tillerson visited London on Monday, was any effort make to persuade the United States to recommit to the Paris agreement, or was that considered simply a waste of time? Sadly, I think that we know the answer to the second question, because we are stuck with a President who does not give a fig about the problems and the future that the world is facing.

I spoke at the outset about the Thurgood Marshall anniversary, which allows us to celebrate the life of a great human rights hero.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

May I ask the right hon. Lady to put on the record a tribute to the BBC journalists and other reporters around the world who highlight to us, with great sensitivity and great honesty, the appalling conflicts, the famines, the plight of refugees, and the cruelty experienced by Christians and other minorities? Will she also pay tribute to those journalists who have given their lives in reporting these issues around the world, and perhaps urge the Minister to do something at the UN to protect them?

[Emily Thornberry]

The hon. Lady is quite right. Unfortunately, far too many journalists around the world are killed for reporting abuses of human rights. I join her in paying tribute to them.

I was talking about Thurgood Marshall’s anniversary, which gives us an opportunity to celebrate the life of this great human rights hero. In three days’ time, we are going to mark another anniversary. Unfortunately, there is no such cause for celebration, but it is central to our discussion. On Saturday, it will be a year since our Prime Minister held hands with Donald Trump just hours before he signed the executive order banning Muslim refugees from America. That was an act devoid of compassion by a President incapable of shame, and the start of a long and painful year of similar acts on the global stage.

We have now reached the stage where Donald Trump can describe the countries of the continent of Africa, including 19 of our Commonwealth cousins, as “shitholes”—and there is not a peep of protest from our Government. Instead, they continue to insist that Her Majesty the Queen, the head of the Commonwealth, must welcome him into her home. Perhaps next time the Foreign Secretary talks about “supine invertebrate jellies” he should take a good look at himself in the mirror.

However, Donald Trump’s behaviour has had one important consequence that goes to the heart of the motion. Last week, a Gallup poll revealed that in the past year global approval of American leadership had fallen to 18%, the lowest in the history of the survey. That leaves a massive void waiting to be filled by a country—so what about us? What about a country such as ours? Are we prepared to take the lead internationally on conflict resolution, climate change, human rights and the refugee crisis? Are we are prepared not just to wring our hands about the suffering of the Rohingya, the Yemeni people and the Palestinian refugees, but to do something—to take a global lead—to end that suffering? Are we prepared to stand up to Donald Trump and tell him clearly that he is not just wrong on UN funding cuts, climate change and refugees, but simply unfit to govern? That is the action we need to take, that is the policy the Labour party stands on and that is the message that this motion sends. I commend it to the House.